First of all, thanks to everyone at Basic Books who worked, or will work, on my book. Writing a book is both a lonely and a collective process, and many of its most important and committed contributors necessarily remain unsung. They are nevertheless deeply appreciated.
Believe it or not, I began researching this book over forty years ago. In the spring of 1980, I spent a semester at Tel Aviv University, where I was lucky enough to study the Israeli/Palestinian issue with faculty members Itamar Rabinovich, Shimon Shamir, and Arnon Gutfeld, among others. Upon returning to my home college, Cornell, I wrote my honors thesis in history, on the relationship between the Vietnam War, the Six-Day War, and the origins of Jewish neoconservatism, under the invaluable guidance of my lifelong academic mentor, Walter LaFeber, finishing in 1982. I must have had an inkling of my future, as I saved all the index cards upon which I took notes from the interviews and readings I did for that essay, which was also read by Benedict Anderson and Isaac Kramnick. A few of my notes actually ended up in these pages.
While earning my master’s degree in international relations at Yale from 1984 to 1986, I did independent study courses on Israel’s wars with Donald Kagan and took classes on military history with Paul Kennedy and on the role of intellectuals in public debate with visiting professor Edward Said. I then picked up my formal research in 1991 as a history (and Jewish studies) PhD student at Stanford University. I spent a year researching a doctoral dissertation on the impact of the founding of the state of Israel on American liberalism. I even signed a book contract for it before deciding to switch topics and writing what eventually became my fourth book, When Presidents Lie. Although I did not end up writing about Israel for my dissertation, however, I did write a series of papers on the topic for my professors during my years at Stanford, and again, saved all those notes and files. They made it into this book too.
At Stanford I worked most closely with my dissertation adviser, Barton J. Bernstein, and on Jewish history and sociology with Steven Zipperstein and Arnie Eisen, respectively. What originally inspired my interest in Jewish history and culture, however, was an adult education class on rabbinical literature that I took in the late 1980s under the auspices of the Fabrangen Havurah in Washington, DC, taught by the rabbi and professor Max Ticktin. Max died at the age of ninety-four in 2016, but I remain deeply appreciative of his role in inducting me into a rich intellectual tradition that has been important to my life ever since. I would also like to thank other scholars, teachers, and rabbis who aided me on this intellectual journey. First and foremost among these is my now close friend Rabbi David Gelfand of Temple Israel of New York, with whom I studied Torah on a weekly basis for over a decade. Also crucial to my Jewish education were the scholars associated with the Hadar Institute, especially the theologian and teacher Rabbi Shai Held.
I’ve written more columns and articles on the subject covered in this book than I can count for more publications than I can remember, and I have taken many reporting trips to Israel and the West Bank. These have included a trip with the Foundation for Middle East Peace, then under the guidance of Matt Duss. (The foundation was also the source of a $20,000 research grant accorded me in 2016.) I went on a second research trip to the same places that year under the auspices of the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies at Brandeis University, following an intense period of study of Israel at Brandeis itself, then under the leadership of the rabbi and professor David Ellenson. (The Nation Institute, which no longer exists, also contributed $5,000 in 2016 to this same worthy cause.) Neither organization, however, enjoyed any input into this book.
I set out to write this book itself sometime in 2015. While writing many drafts between then and now, I benefited enormously from the expert editorial advice and editing from my good friends J. J. Goldberg, Kai Bird, Brian Morton, and (well, she’s more than a friend) Laura Hercher. After the galleys were published and sent out, I received some important help from two people whose work I respected and whom I asked for blurbs but know only professionally. Well beyond the call of duty, Hussein Ibish volunteered a nearly 7,000-word memo filled with useful corrections and a lengthy arguments that immensely improved my final version. David Myers also offered a bunch of helpful suggestions. These now put me more deeply in each scholar’s debt. The value of the combined knowledge, expertise, and patience of these people with my work (and my, um, personality) can hardly be overestimated, and the book’s analysis is far richer and more nuanced, to say nothing of more concise, than it would have been without their generous help. To be perfectly honest, however, I cannot imagine that these people, or anyone else, will agree with everything in this book, and so should not be held responsible.
In addition to Laura’s love and [shocker!] patience, I also remain in the debt of my many friends who listened to me talk about the book over the years who will just have to know who they are, given how long these acknowledgments already are. One person who deserves special mention, however, is my daughter and hero, Eve Rose Alterman, who, as I said in my dedication, has taught me far more than I (or anyone) would have wished to learn about strength, and fortitude, and grace. I hope the book is worthy of her. I also hope she reads it one day.
Finally, my gratitude to my long-suffering parents, Ruth and Carl Alterman, who will be (just about) eighty-eight and ninety-two, respectively, at the time of the book’s publication. Alas, for the twelfth time in the past thirty years, I must regretfully admit that whatever mistakes somehow remain in this book are entirely their fault.
—ERA, 8/31/22